


Penance

by Freakierthanthou



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Blasphemy, Friends to Lovers, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Past Rape/Non-con, Pre-Canon, Religious Conflict, Sex as Penance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:22:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25776592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freakierthanthou/pseuds/Freakierthanthou
Summary: Finding that no form of penance will lift the curse of immortality, Nicolò elects to relive a traumatic experience to punish himself for his sins.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 14
Kudos: 456





	Penance

**Author's Note:**

> Um, how is this the first fic I've posted here in five years? Anyway, I'm in The Old Guard fandom now. This is a kink meme prompt. 
> 
> Please see tags for trigger warnings, and let me know if I missed anything.

Nicolò di Genova knelt by the side of his bedroll, head bowed in prayer. It had been six years since Pope Urban II had promised remission for all sins for any man who freely chose to lay down his life for Christendom, and two years since Nicolò had.

But still, he was troubled. His death had not kept, as if Heaven itself had rejected him. And he felt the same stirrings he had before, as if the sin had not been lifted off his soul. If he even had a soul. “What further penance must I take?” he asked. “Send me a sign of what I must do, and I will do it.”

“Nicolò.” Yusuf, his traveling companion, stood behind him, his bags already packed. “Are you not ready yet?”

Nicolò started. “Yes, of course, just a moment,” he said hurriedly. 

Yusuf looked a little annoyed at this, but he shrugged. “I hope to make Tangier by the end of the week, if we can keep up this pace.” 

“I’m ready,” Nicolò said, rolling the last of his belongings together before Yusuf could drag them back into the argument of where to go next. This was not the sign he had been looking for. It wasn’t. 

But that night, he had a dream. A nightmare, really. An older boy, pushing his face into the dirt, groaning as he entered him and laughing as he cried. His tears turning to mud, to sand, to an empty hut in an abandoned village, where he had finished the wine the previous owners had left behind and leaned in to the boy- no, in real life, it had been Yusuf, Yusuf, Yusuf, but in the dream it was Giovanni, son of a consul, who would never hear his son’s name so besmirched. He leaned in, and was pushed down, again and again, but the kiss he was seeking never came.

He woke in a sweat. An arm’s length from him lay Yusuf al-Kaysani, his mouth opened slightly in sleep, and Nico relaxed. Just a dream. 

For three days, he repeated that refrain to himself every morning when he woke. Just a dream. Not a sign, not a reminder of the stain on his soul, just a dream.

On the third night, woken again before sunrise, to lay in darkness, he had to confess to what he already knew. This was no dream. Yusuf had come into his life as he had died and been rejected from Heaven, had come to him when he had begged God for a sign of his intended penance. This strange man, the man who had slain him, the man he couldn’t kill. At the end of the day, one of them must submit for their infernal bond to be broken and their mortality to be restored. 

It was obvious who it must be. God would not will that one of His loyal servants would bow to an infidel. But the idea of hurting Yusuf in any way, of bringing tears to his eyes, made Nicolò want to die, again and again, until, like broken bones and open wounds, the traitorous thoughts were healed out of his mind. 

“Tell me,” he begged God that night, in Genovese. It felt strange to talk to God in a language other than Latin, but he couldn’t risk Yusuf understanding him. “Is it my destiny to hurt him like this? Or is he my punishment, my penance? Tell me what You want me to do.”

Yusuf looked at him curiously when he returned to their fire. “That’s not your usual prayer,” he remarked. “Is it?” 

Nicolò didn’t answer. 

That night, he dreamed again. It was Yusuf this time, not any stranger, not someone from his past, only Yusuf, lying above him. That soft beard against his lips, that warm body pressed against him, as he felt Yusuf enter him. He woke in a sweat, and desperately hard. 

A penance, then. His flesh refused mortification, but his spirit could still suffer. This may be the most extreme punishment he could imagine. But it was what God demanded of him.

He was silent the rest of the day, ignoring Yusuf’s attempts to engage in conversation. His companion watched him carefully, and once, when they stopped to water their horses, he reached out for Nicolò’s arm. Nico pulled away as sharply as he could.

Dinner did not appeal to him. They had traded for some bread and cheese at the last village they had found, but the thought of eating made his stomach churn. 

“Are you fasting?” Yusuf asked, cocking his head. “Until sundown is traditional among my people, but I don’t know what you Christians do.” 

Nicolò shook his head. “I’m thinking,” he said. 

“Do your thoughts require silence?” Yusuf sounded almost amused. 

Nicolò hesitated. They had been speaking Arabic lately, to improve his skills, but he found himself stumbling over the words. He didn’t know how to say it. “I want you to-” he frowned, “I don’t know the word. اعتدى?”

There was a frown on Yusuf’s face that he wanted to brush away, a look of concern he couldn’t resolve. “Latin?”

“Penetro.”

He saw that Yusuf had taken his meaning. Still, he clarified. “To you?” Nicolò nodded. “Are you certain?”

No, of course he wasn’t, but it was natural for a mortal to flinch from punishment. This didn’t mean that it wasn’t necessary. “I am.” 

Yusuf let out a breath. For a moment, he thought the other man might refuse him- an option God had not prepared him for, but then he nodded. His eyes were wide, and he stood without hesitation to sit closer to Nicolò. 

Nico watched him, feeling a bit like a trapped animal observing a hunter. He waited to be forced to the ground, but instead, when Yusuf bent towards him, he kissed him softly on the lips. Nicolò froze, uncertain how to respond. This wasn’t penance, and it didn’t feel like a punishment, but the way that Yusuf’s mouth moved against his felt like a portion of Heaven. 

Yusuf pulled away first, looking uncertain at his companion’s lack of reaction. “Alright?” he asked.

He found that he couldn’t speak, so instead, Nicolò nodded. “I’m ready,” he said. 

“Oil?” Yusuf asked.

Nico frowned. “What?” he asked. 

“Penetrare, yes? Then we need oil.”

Nicolò didn’t ask why, just shrugged and stood, pulling off his shirt. “Do what you will,” he said. He tried to imagine the he was stripping to be flogged, or for some other punishment of the flesh, not to break his spirit. He tried to breathe steadily.

“Let me,” said a voice behind him. Nicolò startled at the realization that Yusuf was so close, but calmed when he felt a warm hand on his back, steadying him. His other hand was working on Nicolò’s trousers, sliding them down. 

Nicolò glanced back to see that Yusuf was undressing himself. But now that he was facing the other man, Yusuf was kissing him again, his lips warm and wet on the sides of his face. Nicolò pulled away.

“Do you want to stop?” Yusuf’s voice was soft and gentle, like he was calming a wild horse. Nicolò had no doubt that he would if he had asked. Just one more temptation for him to avoid.

“No,” he said, although he did. He turned away so that he didn’t have to look in those kind brown eyes, to see the way Yusuf was looking at him. He stepped away from where their clothes had fallen and knelt on the ground, leaning forward onto his elbows, waiting. 

It felt like an eternity before he heard Yusuf move towards him. A warm hand smoothed down his back, and he felt those lips again at the back of his neck, on his shoulder blade. Hands touched his thighs, rubbing his muscles, before moving upwards. Yusuf whispered something in Arabic that Nicolò hadn’t learned yet, before pressing a slick finger in the cleft of his ass. Nicolò closed his eyes. 

It took longer than it should have. Yusuf was taking his time, crooking a finger inside him in a way that made him gasp. This was not how it was meant to be. 

He took it quietly at first, until Yusuf added a second finger. Then he began to pray. 

Yusuf stopped. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Praying,” said Nicolò. “Continue.”

He heard a low chuckle behind him, and Yusuf muttered something with the word “needy” in it, before he continued. 

When he decided Nicolò was ready, Yusuf pulled his fingers out. He felt the end of Yusuf’s cock against his entrance and whined. 

For a moment, he thought that Yusuf was about to ask him if he was ready again, and he wasn’t sure what he would say. But God did not see fit to tempt him once more. Instead, he felt Yusuf press inside him, filling him up, his ears ringing with the other man’s groans. 

Nico felt tears pricking the edges of his eyes as he whispered his devotions. Yusuf bent over him, filling him even deeper, as he kissed the side of his neck, and Nico couldn’t stop himself from leaning into his warmth and his touch. He was hard, his body betraying him, and he pressed his forehead to the ground, stifling his groans with prayers and his wants with steady breaths. 

When Yusuf pulled back, he thought it was over already. But then he felt gentle hands on his shoulders, and he was rolled, unresisting, onto his back. 

“Like this alright?” Yusuf asked. His hand was on Nicolò’s chest, not pressing or holding him down, just resting there, a casual point of contact. 

“Whatever you want,” Nicolò responded, and he didn’t intend it to come out so breathlessly, but it did. 

Yusuf kissed him.

It was a warm, soft kiss. Nico felt the soft scrape of Yusuf’s beard against his chin, and he opened his mouth without hesitation. Yusuf was slipping a tongue into their kiss, and Nico had never had someone do that before, and he didn’t understand why, but it felt good. His hips bucked upwards without his accord until Yusuf’s hands restrained them, pulling him close and entering him once again. 

This would have been fine, except Yusuf seemed intent on watching him. Those dark eyes on his face seemed to burn into him, and Nicolò could not restrain a small sob from escaping.

“Nico.” It was the first time Yusuf had called him that, and the shock of it was enough that he stilled as the other man slipped out of him, pulling back. “Are you alright?”

Nicolò shuddered. “I’ll be fine,” he said. “We should- it’s not complete yet.” 

Yusuf glanced down at his rapidly softening member. “Few things would take me further from completion than to see you distressed,” he confessed. He was kneeling on the ground, palms on his thighs, as he watched Nicolò, laying debased and unsatisfied in the dirt, tears streaming down his face unrestrained now. “What can I do to help you?” 

Nicolò shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “I need to go- I have to-” he wasn’t thinking clearly, but he stood, gathering his clothes. 

He had a vague thought of praying for forgiveness, pleading for a second chance, but he was stopped by Yusuf’s hand on his wrist. “Nicolò.” His voice was steady, but his eyes were pleading. “Please, tell me what is wrong. Tell me what I have done.”

“Nothing,” Nicolò repeated. “You’ve done nothing wrong, Yusuf. I- it was I who failed.” 

“Failed?” Yusuf looked puzzled. “I do not know how you Franks have sex, but in my experience, it’s not something you can fail at.”

“I failed at my penance.”

“Penance?” 

In all the languages he spoke, Nicolò did not have the words to describe the look that crossed Yusuf’s face at that moment. 

“God called me to repent my sins, to do penance for His forgiveness,” he explained. “But my body heals too quickly to lift this curse from me. If I cannot break my flesh, my spirit will do.”

Yusuf was very quiet. He wasn’t looking at Nicolò anymore, and he found he missed those warm brown eyes on him. “Penance,” he said at last. “That was what this meant to you, penance? This was a punishment?” 

He didn’t wait for Nicolò to respond. He stood up, dressing quickly in rapid, angry movements, his back turned. Nico watched him, unsure what to say. 

“Yusuf,” he said finally, hating how soft his voice came out. “Look at me.”

Yusuf glared at him. “Why?” he demanded. “Is it not enough of a punishment that I would touch you, you need me to look at you as well?”

“No-” Nicolò began, but Yusuf was already lost in his anger.

“How much penance is it worth for me to speak to you right now? Can you substitute every word I say for one prayer? Are you granted amnesty from fasting if I love you, if I fuck you?”

“Yusuf!” Nicolò stood up, not caring that he was still naked. He grabbed the other man’s arms, holding him still. He shook his head, trying to dislodge the words he had just heard- if I love you. “I asked God what I could do to show my repentance to Him,” he explained. “And there you were. I wasn’t sure, so I prayed on it, and He answered me with a dream, for three nights in a row.”

“A dream.”

Nicolò nodded. “He sent me a dream of something that happened when I was young,” he admitted. He had never spoken this aloud before, but his words ran away without his consent, anything to get this man’s eyes on his face once more. “An older boy- debased me, before I joined the priesthood. I understand now, though, why that happened.”

Yusuf was looking at him now, but his eyes were wary, so Nicolò pressed on. “It was punishment for my sins,” he explained. He couldn’t bare to tell Yusuf more, to mention the desires that he had, even before that day. They had been tamped by the punishment, but not even that event had fully extinguished them.

“And it worked,” he said. “I found my calling, dedicated my life to God. But the sins in my heart were not cured, so when the Pope called for loyal servants of the Lord to sacrifice themselves on the Crusades, I followed, not merely for my beliefs, but also for the remission he promised for our sins. And God must have known that, seen that my intentions were impure, and He damned me to this hell.”

“Hell?” Yusuf asked.

“Hell is the absence of God’s love,” Nicolò explained. He wasn’t sure if it was the word Yusuf was stumbling on or the concept. “Being unable to die, unable to join Him in Heaven- that is Hell.”

“So you believe you are in Hell,” Yusuf said slowly. “And that you can be saved only by punishing yourself, by- debasing yourself. With me.” 

Nicolò nodded, and that seemed to break the spell that Yusuf was under. He straightened his shirt, rolling up his belongings without a backwards glance. 

“Yusuf?” Nicolò asked.

The other man turned to look at him for a moment, almost as if he was going to say something, but then he shook his head. “I think it is best if we travel separately for now,” he said. 

Nico scrambled to pull on clothes even as Yusuf was climbing on his horse. “It’s almost nightfall,” he said, hating how his voice sounded like it was pleading. But Yusuf was already riding away, and he did not turn back.

*

Nicolò road East from there until he reached Tangier. He looked, unsuccessfully, for Yusuf, although he knew that he wouldn’t find him. 

They had been arguing, even before Nicolò’s attempt at penance, about where to go next. Nicolò wanted to cross the channel into Spain, find a village somewhere out of the way where they could live in peace for a few years. Yusuf, on the other hand, had wanted to travel to Marrakesh, find a trade route they could pick up, and let the anonymity of the road take them.

The open water tempted him. He could find a monastery and dedicate the rest of his immortal life to serve his God. 

But what penance could he claim to have accomplished when he had driven away the only friend and companion God had seen fit to grant him during his immortal life? His dreams of the strange women, who called to him, gave him no comfort during his waking hours, and more often than not, they were interrupted by dreams of Yusuf, of that firm press inside him, the warm hands on his legs, the lips on his. 

He rode to Marrakesh. For three days, he watched the trade routes, and asked, in his stumbling Arabic, about a man with the strength of ten and a heart of poetry. Needless to say, this did not get him very far. 

He felt someone behind him before he heard any sound, and his longsword was drawn before he could think. Yusuf didn’t even look surprised when the steel touched his throat.

“I heard you were looking for me,” he said mildly. “Are you trying to kill me again?”

Nico put his sword away. The words he had wanted to say to Yusuf once he saw him again died in his throat.

“I need to talk to you,” Nicolò said.

Yusuf shrugged, gesturing as if to tell him to go on. Still, Nicolò hesitated.

“Not here,” he said.

Yusuf considered it for a moment, which stretched into eternity for Nicolò. “I am camped not far from here,” he said at last. “There is privacy enough there.”

He led Nicolò through the streets without looking back once, as if it made no difference to him whether his companion followed. But Nicolò did follow, as close on his heels as he could manage, as Yusuf led him through the red-earth streets and alleyways, where huts and tents and stone houses rose from the ground together. 

Yusuf’s destination turned out to be his tent, the same one that he had used when they had traveled together. It had been less than a week, Nicolò had no reason to think that it would be different, but still, he was pleased to see the familiar setting. He settled on his knees with his palms on his thighs, feeling somewhat like a student preparing to be reprimanded. Yusuf sat facing him, waiting for him to start.

“You left.” The first words out of Nicolò’s mouth were not what he intended, plaintive and hurt rather than the explanation Yusuf deserved. He closed his eyes.

“You gave me no reason to stay.” Yusuf’s voice seemed to surround him in his sightlessness, a mountain of pain in his darkness. When Nicolò opened his eyes, he found that they were wet.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I never meant to hurt you.”

Yusuf wasn’t looking at him. “You were seeking penance from your God, and using me as your punishment.” 

Nicolò couldn’t deny it. “Please believe me when I say, you were not the punishment. I was seeking… humiliation, degradation. But it was in the act that I sought those things, not you.” Never you, he wanted to add, but he didn’t. 

“And you thought that your degradation would please your God?” Yusuf asked. 

“If my body cannot be punished for my sins, if my flesh heals too quickly, then perhaps degradation, pain of the mind or the spirit, could be enough punishment.” He pretended not to see Yusuf’s sharp look in his direction. “Penance is how we seek the Lord’s forgiveness.”

“Penance for what sins, exactly?” Yusuf demanded. When Nicolò wouldn’t meet his eyes, he leaned forward, grabbing his hands. The touch felt like an arrow to the heart- and Nicolò may be the only living person who could say for certain. 

“Nicolò,” Yusuf said. “You may be the kindest man I have ever met, the gentlest spirit I know. You are- you are everything, Nicolò, how could God want your suffering? How could He want anything but your happiness?”

The tears in Nicolò’s eyes fell. He wanted to say that Yusuf didn’t understand, that he couldn’t understand his desire, but he knew that this would be a lie. If I love you. Yusuf’s people, he knew, were no more accepting of this sin than his. But God had sent Yusuf to him, had seen fit to put him in Nicolò’s path when Nico would be most alone. The sign that he had been looking for had been Yusuf all along.

They were kissing before Nicolò knew that he had moved. Yusuf’s lips were warm against his, and if Hell was distance from God, then surely Heaven was closeness to Yusuf. 

*

They slept that night curled around one another in Yusuf’s tent. Despite their deathless state, Yusuf’s skin was warm wherever they touched, and Nico could feel his heartbeat under his hands. He slept better that night than he had for years.

They woke with the city. Nicolò felt warmth in his heart at the sound of Yusuf’s sleepy mumblings, and heat somewhere much lower at the feeling of the body pressed against him. This time, when he kissed him, he was aware of every movement that led to it, as much as he was aware of the exact moment when Yusuf woke up against him. They didn’t pull apart until Nicolò’s hand started trailing lower. 

“We do not have to-” Yusuf started, but Nicolò stopped him with a shake of his head. 

“If you are certain of one thing, I want you to be certain of how much I want this, and how much I want you,” Nicolò said. “Only- perhaps not what we did last.”

“No more invasions?”

“Invasions?”

Yusuf laughed, and Nicolò wanted to hear that sound again and again for the rest of eternity, and was warmed by the realization that he could. “Your Arabic is still terrible, my friend.” He was smiling like he had just seen the creation of all the stars in the sky as he brushed a strand of hair out of Nicolò’s face. “But you must know that I would never hurt you.”

“I know,” Nicolò said, and he did. 

He kissed Yusuf because he didn’t know how to say everything he wanted to, how much he loved this man, love that burned the doubt from the edges of his mind. Yusuf kissed him back like he understood.

They divested of their clothes easily, without bothering to get up. Nicolò whined when Yusuf pulled away from him, until the other man took him into his mouth and his whines turned into gasps. He threaded his fingers through Yusuf’s hair, wanting at once to close his eyes in bliss and to see everything, feel everything, now and forever. Yusuf’s tongue was its own form of magic, and everything around him was warm. Rough hands held his hips down from bucking into Yusuf’s mouth, and he could feel the callouses from the weapons that had killed him so many times, and hoped that he would feel their caresses many more.

Nicolò was hyper-aware of everything, could hear his own voice becoming higher and more ragged as he came close to completion. Yusuf must have heard it too because he pulled off, sliding up his body and kissing him with a desperation that Nicolò more than matched. Nico reached down, desperate to touch Yusuf, to feel all of them, and found Yusuf’s hand already there, guiding him around their members, tangling their fingers where their bodies were pressed together. Nicolò wouldn’t pretend that he had never engaged in onanism, but this was like nothing he had ever felt.

“Nico,” Yusuf whispered into his mouth.

“Yusuf, love, please. Don’t stop.” 

“I won’t.” 

A particularly sharp rock of Yusuf’s hips took Nicolò by surprise, and he yelled, louder then intended. Yusuf made a soft noise against his mouth, but didn’t break the kiss. Nicolò groaned and spilled over their joined hands, hips bucking almost out of control. Yusuf followed shortly behind him. 

They curled around each other until their breathing steadied. Nicolò used part of their shared blanket to clean them off. 

“You’re washing that,” Yusuf said, but he sounded too contented to be annoyed. 

“Whatever you want, my beloved,” Nicolò responded, in poorly-accented Arabic, and was gratified to hear Yusuf’s laugh once again. He kissed him as though he was chasing the sound. 

“Did this feel like a penance?” Yusuf asked him finally. 

Nicolò shook his head. Wrapped in Yusuf’s arms, feeling the other man’s heartbeat against his chest, he felt safer than he could remember ever feeling before. The noises from outside their tent told them that people were starting their days, but he felt no compulsion to join them, instead snuggling closer against Yusuf. “Not in the least,” he said. 

There was more to say, more of his faith to reconcile, but not now. Now, this moment, this was for them.

**Author's Note:**

> I did very little research outside of google translate and wikipedia for this! I took one year of Arabic about ten years ago, my partner knows Latin but I elected not to ask them for help because we were watching Star Trek at the time and I didn't feel like pausing. I bring my trashfire of poorly-researched porn and blasphemy to this fandom, and I'm not leaving.


End file.
